BRISTOL, Tenn. — NASCAR’s new points system is supposed to encourage more rubbing-is-racing type moments, and if there’s one track where rubbing is racing, it's Bristol Motor Speedway.

When the drivers race Sunday afternoon on the 0.533-mile high-banked concrete oval, they will have to make a choice of how much rubbing and bumping they want to do. It used to be simple at Bristol, but since the grinding of the upper groove in the summer of 2012, the cars run much closer to the wall, making wrecking someone to pass more of a challenge.

Late in the Food City 500 last year, Kasey Kahne didn’t put a bumper on Matt Kenseth while challenging for the lead, in part because of Kahne’s driving philosophy and his inability to figure out the best way to make the bump-and-run work.

“You don’t want to go throw your trash in your neighbor’s yard just for the hell of it,” series points leader Dale Earnhardt Jr. said. “But if you give me a good reason, I might do it. So if you want to dump somebody at a racetrack like this, you’re going to need a really good reason to do it.”

Some of NASCAR's wildest and craziest moments have happened at Bristol, including Tony Stewart throwing his helmet at Kenseth’s car after a wreck in 2012 and Dale Earnhardt wrecking Terry Labonte for the win in 1999.

Six-time Cup champion Jimmie Johnson said if he wrecks someone, it will be a mistake because he will try not to put a driver into the wall to make a pass. He might try to get another driver a bit loose but not enough to bend much sheet metal.

“If I have to, I will,” Johnson said about bumping someone. “But I’m probably going to be saying, ‘I’m sorry’ after.”

Kyle Busch said that racing at Bristol is a bigger challenge because the high groove is the preferred groove, so bumping someone to move them up the track and then drive underneath is not as strong an option considering the wall and the momentum the car in front already has.

“It’s probably a little bit harder to move somebody out of the way when you’re running the top,” said Matt Kenseth, Busch’s Joe Gibbs Racing teammate.

“If you can get off the corner better than somebody and you can get a run underneath them enough, the pass you probably see for the win is to try to … slide up in front of them, hope you clear them and hope they don’t cross over and pass you back.”

Earnhardt said he believes Kahne would have been more aggressive last year if the current points system was in place. The current system is designed to put all race winners into the Chase for the Sprint Cup.

“If you’ve got a guy running second within reach of the leader and he needs a win, he’s going to do probably a little more than what he probably would have done last year, probably be a little more aggressive and rightfully so,” Earnhardt said.

But as Johnson said, that’s easier said than done.

“It takes me longer to set up a bump-and-run and set up a wrecked car — it’s a delicate touch to get in there and move somebody in the right way — that I waste more time doing that than it does to get inside of them and try to pass them,” Johnson said.

It all comes down to finesse. Drivers will wreck each other, but they will need a good reason to do so, Earnhardt said, and then do their best to have just enough contact to make the pass and not trash a car.

“(Fans) don’t like you to park a guy — it’s just wrong to fence a guy and end his race,” Earnhardt said. “I don’t think the drivers ever intentionally do that. I’ve tried to move guys and accidentally spun them out before. That happens.”

The victim will be upset — and probably have a good memory.

“Nobody likes to get showed up, put in the fence or moved out of the way — you feel had,” Earnhardt said. “You obviously are going to have a tinge of revenge in the back of your mind. You will carry it with you.”